STILL DRAWING COMMENT

Chronicle (Levin), 2 December 1949, Page 5

STILL DRAWING COMMENT

(N.Z.P.A.-

-Reuter.

jT.fev — - — — 5- ■ ■ i Overseas Interest In Resnlt , 4)f ItZ, fle#w % ;

Comriahiy

Received Fridgy, '9.20 q.m. v " " 'MONT^EAL, Dec; 1. The. New Zealand eleetion result qontinues to be the sufcject of : editqrigl cpmnjent in United States anrd Canadian newspapers. The Wali Street Journgl. said: "It would bev drawing a lorig bow to infer thait* the result is a .sign qf worjd-wide 'times. StealingYtlie. opposition's clothes . or " campaign ammunition was: tlie Repu!blic%s master strategy here in- 1948, did not master a,nything. Ctafty oppprtunism is iiot yet a basic issue in the United States wha.tever it may- be in New Zealand or tlie Un|tpd Kingdom." -vMost 'Canadian neyspapers .de-. sprfbed the result as a sign* that the welfare state does not work. The Montreal Gazette said : ."It is of ten saifl about socialist Govr ernments that 'nobody will shoot Santa Claqs,' but Santa Claus who comes back with bills and insists upon payipent, ceases to appear quite such a jolly old elf. Socialists here and elSewhere said . New Zealand was the laboratory for social experiments. Like any other laboratory experiment, it required time rightly to estimate the results. These, after 14 years, are how evident. The experiment will have its uses." The Toronto Giobe and Mail said that socialists world-wide had been robbed of their favourite "ideal state." It ad'ded that the Labour Party claimed that it had freed New Zealand from want and the fear of want. "The people's qnswer was to throw it out of office before it also freed them from their remaining freedoms." • Only the - Ottawa Citizen had symRathy for the outgoing regime. It said that the verdiet would be misun'derstood if it was inferpreted any where as a rejection of social security. "It is a change of .managers. There is much that will endure in Labour's achievements. "New Zealand has came to 00cupy a special place in political thought ahd "tbe affections of people everywhere. It has suffered from the role of guinea pig in the social laboratory in a generation which has seen the democratic world move into a welfare state. It is an agreeable land whose people have resDonded magniflcpntly to war's perils and experimented boldlv in solving the social dilemmas of peace. Its contribution to world progress is by 'no means at an end despite a change of Government."